Importance of Keeping Up with Family History

The importance of keeping up with family history may only be apparent as health issues become threatening. Diabetes, hearth disease, high blood pressure, stroke, cancer and other common illnesses are passed from generation to generation. Alzheimer’s and depression are diagnosed and treated best when health history is available. Excessive use of drugs or alcohol may contribute to depression or they may cause greater depression. Women have depression more often than men.

It is not always our genes that cause disease. Cancer may be caused by diet, lack of exercise, over weight, smoking and alcohol abuse. The environment we live in can cause cancer. The air we breathe may have toxic fumes or smog that contribute or cause other illnesses.

The family health history is a tool doctors rely on to diagnose your current health treatment or health risk. Many web sites encourage the use of the family health tree. They encourage recording the date an illness began and any death dates. The health records should include mother, father, brothers, sisters and all blood relatives of both paternal and maternal sides for all available past and present generations. Adoption and the history of multiple sexual partners should not be overlooked.

The U.S. Surgeon General’s office has emphasized the importance with an improved Internet health history tool. The Center for Disease Control and many other federal agencies have joined the Surgeon General’s office supporting an effort to get families to keep health records. The Surgeon General encourages families take advantage of the Thanksgiving gatherings to discuss and record family illness and cause of any deaths.